About the Energy Initiative
The Energy Initiative is a collective of planners, designers, and others with an interest in the intersection between the spaces we inhabit and the ever-shifting sources of the energy we consume. The initiative provides a forum for discussion, investigation, and contribution to the advancement of collective knowledge of the planning and design professional fields in the area of energy.
For more information about the Northern Section Energy Initiative, contact us.
Recent News
By Hing Wong, AICP, and Alex Hinds. Northern Section is launching a new initiative – Connecting the Americas: Collaborative Planning, North and South. We are also exploring less expensive, shorter, in-person international activities and trips toward involving students and emerging and mid-career planners.
By Curtis Driscoll, San Mateo Daily Journal, July 29, 2021. The plan calls for improving service, evaluating funding, and completing a business-case analysis of potential transit network management reforms by mid-2022.
By Kurtis Alexander, San Francisco Chronicle, July 29, 2021. If an emergency fix like the old train is agreed upon, there are still questions about the long-term viability of Mendocino’s water supply.
By Ned Resnikoff, New York Times, July 26, 2021. Homelessness is a humanitarian disaster and a threat to democracy. The cost to overcome it will be high, but the cost of inaction is far higher.
By Richard Halstead, Marin Independent Journal, July 24, 2021. The project is one of ten following an executive order to create an inventory of state-owned parcels suitable for expedited housing development.
SF skyline from Oakland March 2021. IN THIS ISSUE: Don Bradley profile • RLUIPA • Three housing articles: ditching R-1, getting back to the missing middle, and hotels for survivors • Locals win state, national awards • New AICP CM requirements • New admits to AICP • Career advice • Who’s where (19) • Planning news roundup (17) • Where in the world (4).
SF skyline from Barcelona Avenue (Aliza Knox). IN THIS ISSUE: Meet a local planner • Planning through an equity lens • Cities are better without cars • Contracts compromise equity, access • Get CM ethics credits • Who’s where (7) • Planning news roundup (17) • Where in the world (4).
From TransitCenter, June 17, 2021. The dashboard visualizes disparities in accessibility and reliability of transit across race, income, and other characteristics from February 2020 through February 2021.
By Emma Marris, The Atlantic, June 5, 2021. Policy that promotes restoration led by Klamath Tribes, federal investment, and partnership with California and Oregon farmers will likely be crucial.
By Natalie Orenstein, Oaklandside, June 3, 2021. At a Planning Commission meeting, planning staff and the Oakland Fire Department proposed a blanket ban, while many callers wanted a targeted approach.
From Metropolitan Transportation Commission, Mass Transit Magazine, June 2, 2021. A partnership between MTC and World Institute on Disability resulted in a 2.5-year research and community engagement study with recommendations.
By J.K. Dineen, San Francisco Chronicle, May 21, 2021. The legislation requires 15 percent of new housing units be affordable to low-income families and that the projects be built with union labor.
By Nico Savidge, Mercury News, May 11, 2021. One of the Bay Area’s least-used freeways could become a tree-lined boulevard with new parks, housing and other development.
By Lisa Song and James Temple, ProPublica, April 29, 2021. A new analysis identifies serious flaws in the methodology used by the state Air Resources Board to assign carbon offset value to forests.
By UC Berkeley’s Terner Center for Housing Innovation, April 22, 2021. Results suggest that ADUs do provide relatively affordable rental housing units for Californians, but the benefits may not be equitably shared.
From HUD User, PD&R Edge, April 19, 2021. Fresno Housing Authority, in partnership with HUD, challenged student teams to draft affordable housing proposals for a five-parcel site in an agricultural community.
Meet a local planner • Big GP update for Oakland (photo above) • Two articles on SB 35 ruling • Student field research results • How to fix participatory planning • ‘Where in the world’ photos • Who’s where • Planning news roundup, and much more.
By Jennifer Wadsworth, San Jose Spotlight, March 31, 2021. Berryessa flea market business owners and their representatives expect the city or some other public entity to help prevent displacement and gentrification.
From Barcelona Institute for Global Health, March 30, 2021. This study is the first to estimate premature mortality impacts and the distribution by socioeconomic status of multiple environmental exposures related to urban planning and transport in the two cities.
(Above: The Ferry Point tunnel connects Point Richmond’s ‘Bayside’ with its ‘refinery side.’ Photo: George Osner, AICP) • IN THE MAY ISSUE: Updating plans for Milpitas’ already successful TOD • Market research for post-pandemic planning • Northern Section’s 2021 award winners • A book review • ‘Where in the world’ photos • ‘Who’s where’ • ‘Planning news roundup,’ and much more.
From UC Berkeley’s Terner Center for Housing Innovation, February 9, 2021. Four factors led to cost and time savings on the 833 Bryant Street development compared to similar projects.
(Mt. Tamalpais and Angel Island, from Oakland. Photo: E. Rynecki, Feb. 2021) Featured articles: • Artist-driven community engagement • Work through community conflict on climate change by confronting fears • Pandemic severely impacted taxable retail sales in Napa-Sonoma Wine Country • and a seven-page manga on the life and work of Denise Scott Brown.
NBC Bay Area, January 4, 2021, and SF Examiner, January 11, 2021. The hospital modernization and expansion promises investments in housing, transit, and workforce training, but supervisors want legal assurance of UCSF’s commitments.
(Above: Marin County’s only unaltered one-room schoolhouse, in use 1864-1957. Photo: George Osner, AICP) This month we have four featured and local articles including one by North Coast planner Krystle Heaney, AICP, on planning in small towns.
By Kate Cimini, Salinas Californian, November 23, 2020. As farmworkers and their families dangerously overcrowd available housing, California’s coastal counties look to streamline production of safer housing.
(Vasona Lake County Park, Los Gatos. Photo: Juan Borrelli, AICP) We’ve kept Northern News coming your way, and despite the pandemic, readership has increased by 60 to 80 percent since our March issue. Thank you, loyal readers!
In spite of all the craziness and losses in 2020, I’m so grateful for my family, good friends, and for my job as the City of San Jose’s Small Business Ally, which has allowed me to work from home to continue to serve my community — in particular minority, new immigrant, and vulnerable population small businesses that have been hit so hard by the ongoing pandemic. I’m also grateful to be able to give back to my profession by serving as the California Planning Foundation (CPF) President. Please help us reach our 2020 CPF Scholarship Fundraising goal by making a tax-deductible donation securely online.
Photo of Bay Bridge eastern span by Rich Hay. In this issue: Revitalizing our neighborhoods and parks • What to do about Plan Bay Area • Holiday planning • Mentorship program • Project Homekey in Oakland • Planning news roundup • And lots more.
By Miriam Solis, Planetizen, August 11, 2020. A case study of a San Francisco wastewater plant considers the consequences of redeveloping, rather than siting, a locally unwanted land use.
By Michael Andersen, Sightline Institute, August 11, 2020. Portland’s new upzoning reforms allow for a wide range of “middle housing” citywide and removes parking mandates from most residential land.
By Marc Abizeid, UC Berkeley’s Othering & Belonging Institute, August 11, 2020. From the first-ever analysis of the proportion of single-family zoning in every Bay Area jurisdiction comes five general policy approaches to help address racial residential segregation.
Bay City News Service, Mountain View Voice, August 8, 2020. The tax would generate the necessary funding to operate the imperiled system if ultimately approved by two-thirds of voters across three affected counties.
By Will Houston, Marin Independent Journal, August 7, 2020. A new Stanford study shows the North Bay may receive less flooding compared to other parts of the Bay Area, but the flooding occurs at critical connections where few alternative routes exist.
By Brentin Mock, Bloomberg CityLab, August 6, 2020. A letter with hundreds of signatories from across the planning field argues that planning decisions have historically contributed to police violence and harassment of Black people.
J.K. Dineen, San Francisco Chronicle, August 5, 2020. After a general plan change, Sausalito residents argue whether to expand light industry or allow some senior or affordable housing.
By Dorothy Walker, Streetsblog USA, August 3, 2020. Dorothy Walker, founding president of APA, says cities’ local land-use decisions are “ripe for transformation” to lower barriers to housing for the “disadvantaged, disenfranchised, and the community at large.”
By Luke Johnson, San Jose Spotlight, July 22, 2020. County lawmakers considered a proposed ballot measure for a one-eighth cent sales tax to prevent Caltrain from potentially shutting down, ultimately deferring a vote on the proposal to a special meeting on August 6.
By Alyssa Chung, Meredith Rupp, and Carla Violet, July 23, 2020. What can we learn from planners who have adjusted their outreach to conform to social distancing protocols? Photo: Screenshot of an online presentation of a site plan to a virtual audience.
Lina Velasco, AICP, Community Development Director for the City of Richmond, holds a master of community and regional planning from Cornell University. She discusses her work, professional views, and issues in her city. Interview by Catarina Kidd, AICP, July 2020.
(Zoning, San Luis Ranch Specific Plan, San Luis Obispo) By Henry Pontarelli, July 8, 2020. Don’t expect to see cities transformed before your eyes during your planning career. Consensus is hard fought and hard earned, funding is scarce, conviction comes in cycles; but incremental change will build to meet collective goals.
(BLM Plaza, Washington, DC. Photo: Victoria Pickering, https://bit.ly/3eZwi9A) By Georgia Sarkin, AICP, July 6, 2020. How can cities evolve for the better after Covid-19 and Black Lives Matter? Five factors affecting public space are crucial to consider — infrastructure, evolution, density, mobility, and equity.
(Photo: William Cooley) By Sajuti Rahman Haque, June 29, 2020. Community meeting and engagement tactics are evolving to accommodate Covid-19 distancing orders, but key characteristics of in-person, physically present meetings remain invaluable.
(Dolores Park photo by Christopher Michel https://bit.ly/3j1OlhJ) After nearly 200 interviews with local governments, planners, and communities, Diana Benitez and Jessica Medina report on actions being taken to protect community health, and implications for implementing SB1000, the Planning for Healthy Communities Act.
(Photo: Tom Rumble, https://bit.ly/3esvlpo) By David Woltering, AICP, June 24, 2020. Despite its challenges, our profession is a noble one. This business of creating and maintaining safe, healthy, and livable communities for all can be immensely satisfying and extremely interesting.
By John King, San Francisco Chronicle, July 20, 2020. Only July 10, Association of Bay Area Governments and Metropolitan Transportation Commission released a draft of Plan Bay Area 2050 for public comment. It emphasizes 25 “bold strategies” for making the region “affordable, connected, diverse, healthy and vibrant for all.”
By Sonya Herrera, San Jose Spotlight, July 18, 2020. The commercial linkage fee will go to the City Council on Aug. 25 and become effective on Nov. 14, if adopted.
From The New York Times, July 16, 2020, comes another perceptive article on gentrification and race by Emily Badger and Quoctrung Bui. High-end development has transformed some Black neighborhoods into high-end development decades after they were scarred by unrest.
By Patrick Sisson, CityLab, July 15, 2020. To improve quality of life for an urbanite and boost the possibilities for municipal and economic recovery, you need to reduce the access radius for six essential functions: Living-dwelling, working, supplying and buying, well-being and caring, learning, and leisure.
By Lauren Hepler, CalMatters, July 15, 2020. Old regimes of housing and job discrimination have given way to predatory loans, disinvestment, and flare-ups of racism or violence in areas that once promised a level playing field.
By Emilie Raguso, Berkeleyside, July 10, 2020. Berkeley’s Zoning Adjustments Board approved a new supportive housing complex that substantially lowered development costs through modular construction.
By Paavo Monkkonen, Ian Carlton, and Kate Macfarlane, UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies, July 7, 2020. HCD guidelines emphasize realistic assessment of market and site capacity for new housing. Legislative efforts to promote fourplexes led UCLA’s Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies to analyze their feasibility on 6.8 million existing single-family home parcels.
By Brian D. Taylor and Yu Hong Hwang, June 30, 2020. The “85th percentile rule” has been used for decades to set speed limits in jurisdictions across the US. New research shows it originated earlier than most thought, and it was intended as a starting point in setting speed limits, not a firm guideline.
Via email from Leslye Corsiglia, SV@Home, June 11, 2020. The SAAG will meet for the first time since January. All are welcome. Take the opportunity to offer feedback on the City’s most recent analyses and proposals related to the Diridon Station Area Plan. The General Plan Four-Year Review Task Force is also restarting, with the first video meeting June 25.
By Leila Hakimizadeh, AICP, and John David Beutler, AICP, June 3, 2020. Desperately-needed new housing can be added if we upgrade zoning and design standards and adopt policies that promote smart density, protect existing residents, and preserve affordable homes.
(Photo: Part of an Earth Day project, Alto International School, Menlo Park) Local government planning in a post-COVID-19 world • TDM in a post-pandemic world • Reflections between Zoom meetings • Meet a local planner • Director’s note • Where in the world • Who’s where • Planning news roundup
By Marisa Kendall, The Mercury News, May 7, 2020. Ruling ends a years-long battle over massive redevelopment of failed shopping mall in Cupertino. Decisions in two SB 35 cases say cities must apply objective design and planning standards in a very clear way.
By Jeff Davis, Eno Center for Transportation, April 8, 2020. Gas rationing wasn’t rolled out to the whole country until December 1, 1942. But the VMT reductions were obvious as soon as rationing started in the East six months earlier.
Excerpted from a May 4 blog post on APA Los Angeles by Richard Willson, Ph.D., FAICP, Professor, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Cal Poly Pomona. Most planners bring a sense of idealism to their chosen profession.
By Bruce Schaller, CityLab, May 4, 2020. Americans have always had difficulty with urban density, but in a crisis, we need what cities can provide. (Schaller is the former deputy commissioner of traffic and planning at the New York City Transportation Dept.)
(Above: Guadalupe River Trail, Jason Su) • Avery Livengood, AICP: Green gentrification • From past Section Directors: Marlene Stevenson, Darcy Kremin, AICP • “Meet a local planner” in academe • Audrey Shiramizu: TDM post-pandemic • Micromobility can rebuild cities (Next City) • Where in the world • Who’s where • “What will our future look like?” • TWO news roundups.
By Ida Mojadad, San Francisco Examiner, April 9, 2020. After six years of public hearings, the San Francisco Planning Commission has approved the initiation of a General Plan Amendment for an 1,100-unit complex. Half of the units are to be permanently affordable for those with up to 120 percent of the area median income (AMI).
By Katherine Guyot and Isabel V. Sawhill, Brookings, April 6, 2020. Telecommuting has been the fastest-growing method of commuting over the last several years. The pandemic promises to accelerate this trend dramatically.
By Rina Chandran, Thomson Reuters Foundation, April 1, 2020. Losing heritage to modernization is not inevitable, but it requires careful choices as to what should go, what should stay, and what should come in place of things that are removed.
By Jonathan Schuppert, AICP, April 15, 2020. When and as restrictions on travel and assembly are gradually lifted under State guidance, implementation will largely be local. Planners should continue to lead by example, learn from others, and adapt as needed.
By J.K. Dineen, San Francisco Chronicle, March 25, 2020. Over labor issues, Concord’s City Council declined to extend negotiations with a building group hoping to redevelop a 5,000-acre former military base. As costs have soared, the many proposed community benefits no longer appeared financially feasible to the developer.
By Louis Hansen, The Mercury News, March 23, 2020. Housing developers are concerned that the shift by local governments to virtual planning and inspection could hamper their ability to meet tight construction deadlines.
By J.D. Morris, San Francisco Chronicle, March 15, 2020. Emergency officials in Sonoma County are already planning for the potential problems of wildfires and COVID-19 occurring at the same time.
By Lou Corpuz-Bosshart, UBC News, March 23, 2020. Regional housing inequality needs to be addressed. It makes no sense to continue a trend where increasingly the rich live in Vancouver and wage earners who provide services to the city are being forced further and further east.
By Melanie Curry, StreetsBlog Cal, March 5, 2020. Early in March, two California Senate committees held a joint hearing on reducing GHG emissions from transportation, the state’s highest-emitting sector.
By Michelle Goldberg, The New York Times, March 17, 2020. “When the Corona virus emergency is over, people are likely to emerge into fundamentally changed cities, with economies in crisis, and beloved restaurants, businesses, and cultural institutions gone for good. I wonder if our cultural romance with urban living will recover.”
By Michael Tatarski, New Naratif, March 16, 2020. Vietnam is often portrayed with bountiful economic opportunities for people across classes. But the construction and development that boosts economic growth is affecting health and quality of life, leaving people to deal with the situation according to their means.
By Adam Rogers for Wired.com, February 23, 2020. Scholars say newly constructed flood-fighting infrastructure has promoted gentrification. In 2017, Northern News covered efforts in North Richmond to foster shoreline resilience without displacement.
By Candace Jackson, The New York Times, February 25, 2020. The Times’ Real Estate section highlighted Antioch for its relatively affordable housing and BART access. We have included a response from Antioch’s Community Development Director at the end of the article.
By Maggie Angst, Bay Area News Group, February 27, 2020. Forty tiny homes and supportive services dedicated for the homeless have opened near the San Jose Flea Market, about three miles north of downtown, on a site owned by the Valley Transportation Agency.
By Sasha Perigo, San Francisco Examiner, March 8, 2020. San Francisco voters passed Proposition E, “The Balanced Development Act,” which ties the City’s cap on approved office space construction to its progress on the State’s affordable housing goals.
By Adam Brinklow, Curbed SF, March 9, 2020. San Francisco’s Planning Department released a Housing Affordability Strategy that identifies the current state of the City’s housing, and three core strategies.
By Alexei Koseff, San Francisco Chronicle, March 9, 2020. Senator Wiener’s SB 902 would allow by-right development of multi-unit housing in single-family zones statewide, while scaling the number of allowable units to city size.
By Richard Davis, associate editor. San Jose voters have likely passed Measure E, a new funding source for affordable housing and homelessness support programs funded by a property sale transaction tax.
All of us are dealing with a loss of normalcy. Your editors have met the challenge with another issue of locally authored articles, announcements, and interesting news summaries. As we planners physically separate from one another, let’s challenge our professional selves to maintain an abiding sense of service to, and caring for, our communities. (Photo: An empty Facebook campus on March 12.)
Due to concerns about limiting in-person events during the coronavirus outbreak, NORTHERN SECTION is cancelling the annual ethics/law training event previously scheduled for March 21, 2020, at the Alameda County Training and Education Center in Oakland. If you still need Ethics credits, you may view the webinar on the Ethics Cases of the Year presented
By Rosanna Xia, Los Angeles Times, February 24, 2020. Sea walls are forbidden, real estate sales must disclose sea level rise, and the city is working to move infrastructure and resort properties away from the water.
(Photo: Chris Hadfield, NASA, 2014.) In this issue: BART progresses toward developing land at its stations under AB 2923. A 2019 book addresses the disinvestment/investment conundrum. Making it easier to negotiate the maze of Bay Area transit agencies. Deadline March 13 for Section Award nominations. Plus “Meet a local planner,” “Where in the world,” “Who’s where,” and a note from our new Director.
By Patrick Sisson, Curbed, February 12, 2020. The traditional public meeting can be exclusionary and does not often result in the kind of participation and experiences for citizens that encourage feedback. But the current public hearing process can be enhanced, and there are alternatives to be considered.
By Adam Brinklow, Curbed, February 5, 2020. A new bill would establish a single universal bus fare across the Bay Area, create a combined transit map and departure time reference, and develop a transfer that works across every transit line.
In an interview by Lori Pottinger, PPIC, on February 3, 2020, Letitia Grenier speaks of the huge potential to work across jurisdictions and redesign systems to let natural processes solve some of our more complicated flooding problems.
By Guy Marzorati, KQED, February 11, 2020. A proposed development for a 400-acre private property in Danville would accommodate 69 new residential units and leave 213 acres of publicly accessible open space. But the Danville Open Space Committee — a citizens group — gathered thousands of signatures to challenge the project on the March 3rd ballot. Stay tuned.
By Zachary Clark, Daily Journal, February 7, 2020. Measure P is a 2004 extension of a measure approved by voters in 1991 and is set to sunset by the end of the year. Now a group of San Mateo residents is pushing to extend Measure P’s existing building height limits while exempting areas around transit from the measure’s height and density restrictions.
By Emily DeRuy, Mercury News, February 6, 2020. New apartment complexes built on Caltrain land near Caltrain stations must reserve at least 30 percent of their units for low-income residents. But there’s no requirement that such sites be reserved for housing.
By Emily DeRuy, Mercury News, February 16, 2020. Without AB 1763, the density limits of 50 units per acre approved by city voters in 1991 would have limited the number of affordable homes that could be built on the city-owned site.
From Mirage News (Australia), January 28, 2020. ‘If reducing the road toll is your ultimate goal, it is better to invest in safer alternative transport options than continuing to focus on car-based safety interventions,’ said lead researcher Dr. Jason Thompson. The University of Melbourne research highlights the importance of urban design and planning as key to reducing transport-related injuries across the world. Hat tip to The Overhead Wire.
By Jenny Schuetz, Brookings’ The Avenue, February 5, 2020. “It may just be the meticulous recreation of 19th century New England in Greta Gerwig’s ‘Little Women’ that has the most to say about American homes, even offering some bold yet sensible lessons to improve our own 21st century housing policy.”
Senate Bill 50, in a Senate vote late Wednesday afternoon, fell three votes short of the 21 it needed to advance to the State Assembly. Senate President pro Tempore Toni Atkins, a supporter, said, ‘SB 50 might not be coming forward right now, but the status quo cannot stand.’
By Michael Kimmelman, The New York Times, January 28, 2020. “Jane Jacobs wasn’t focused on gentrification, and New York is not Palo Alto is not Barcelona is not Hong Kong: Density is not one size fits all. Urbanism isn’t a mere kit of parts. That said, the implications today are still plain for rezoning legislation like [California’s] SB 50.”
To kick off 2020, we’re featuring articles on Oakland 2100-The Game, results from January’s Northern News survey, tiny homes for homeless vets in Sonoma Co., and the passing of a planning pioneer. Plus our regular features: “Meet a local planner,” “Where in the world,” “Who’s where,” and the “Director’s note” with a surprise announcement.
By Annie Sciacca, Bay Area News Group, January 8, 2020. The Concord City Council decided not to step into a dispute between the developer and local labor over how much of the $6 billion redevelopment of old Navy land should be built by union workers. The council instead instructed both sides to keep negotiating, for which it established non-binding guidelines. A city staff report suggests the developer might walk away from the project if forced to use more union labor.
By Kerry Cavanaugh, editorial writer, LA Times, Jan 7, 2019. State Senator Scott Wiener’s amendments to SB 50 aim to alleviate the criticisms that the bill robs well-intentioned communities of the opportunity to accommodate denser and more affordable housing near transit on their own terms. The bill now allows cities two years to adopt their own plans to increase the amount of market-rate and affordable housing built near transit and job centers.
Above: SF General Hospital and SF skyline, photo by Diana Elrod. This issue features 4 original, local articles; 4 “Wh